Best way to notify schools of a recent award - Page 2

bethievt · 02-06-2008, 09:25 AM

It probably does keep happening to some extent, but I know I am MUCH more mellow about his college grades than HS grades. I never pressured him about grades in HS but I was much more concerned about them because I wanted him to have all the best chances for college admissions. I feel as if grad schools will view less-than-perfect grades from his college as still good enough and I don't think college grades really mean much in the world of work. So I feel that he's jumped through the biggest hoop already.

soozievt · 02-06-2008, 09:34 AM

It's not the grades or anything like that. What I meant is the PROCESS of applying/waiting for all these other "acceptance" sorts of things and going through the unknown aspect and it is in someone else's hands, etc. I wasn't really involved in grades in HS or now with them in college. It so happens that my kids want to do well and our only expectation is to do your best. It happens to be a nonissue for us with them.

But I was talking more the angst of who will grant them acceptance for the internship, the job, the grad school, or for one of my kids, constant auditions in her field. All these experiences we have shared with our kids since HS all involve the "unknown" and some stress or angst. It didn't end with college admissions, I meant. One of my kids is a grad school applicant and most of her schools accept about 10% of those who apply. Here we go again! Grades actually are the least important in her particular process (though she has good ones). It is very subjective and the biggest chunk of getting in is based on a portfolio. Anyway, I have gone through the "big wait" with them several times over since graduation from HS....for summer jobs, internships, auditions, grad school, etc. Right now, one has the summer job offer lined up. Another has to go through the entire competitive internship application process all over again for this summer like last summer, and in fact simultaneously with grad school admissions. So, it never really ends on that front, it seems. I'm less involved in their lives but I am still involved in that they share about this stuff, want some guidance, etc. And like with college admissions, the outcome is in someone else's hands and so there is a lot of wondering and waiting and hoping involved.

wjb · 02-06-2008, 10:16 AM

Thanks for raising this question, mammall. My son had planned to ask the GC to include a short update with midyear grades (which haven't yet gone out at my son's HS) but this thread caused me to rethink that plan. I phoned Admissions at his schools. They want snail mail sent directly to Admissions, not to the Regional Rep. At this late point, they said, both e-mail and fax are overloaded and so are not reliable methods of transmitting information.

rainmama · 02-06-2008, 10:24 AM

My son sent snail mail about his Presidential Scholar nomination, with the GC's encouragement. However, the GC says colleges really don't care whether you advance to NM finalist from semifinalist. So I wonder if S ought to send in a second letter about National Merit, or just assume adcoms don't care. Any advice?

mammall · 02-06-2008, 11:04 AM

rainmama - Maybe adcoms are ho-hum about advancing to NMF from NMSF - but typical high school seniors and their families are pretty excited by it. I'd like to include it in my D's update if it comes in time and if she gets it.
Does anyone know when those come out?

bethievt · 02-06-2008, 11:38 AM

Some schools are so interested in the NMF designation that they offer full scholarships, others really want it as a stat, so they can say x% of their applicants were NMF. Many, though not all, give some type of scholarship for this themselves. About half of the schools my son was accepted to would have given him NM money if he hadn't gotten a corporate NM award through his father's employer. One would have tacked on an additional $3,000 per year, specifically related to NMF status. And it may have been a factor that entered into other merit awards he received.

What I did hear from several posters last year was that just being a candidate for Presidential Scholar was as highly valued by many adcoms as actually receiving the award. There may be a few schools that wouldn't care at all about these awards, but I think only a handful.

CountingDown · 02-06-2008, 11:59 AM

Mammall,
I heard that GCs were notified of NMF status on 2/2 and that letters are being sent to students' homes on 2/8.

mammall · 02-06-2008, 12:37 PM

Thanks, CountingDown. Maybe it's hubris but I do expect our kids to make NMF - isn't it just a small percentage who don't? Although my D's application looked atrocious - she used elmer's glue to attach the essay and it stiffened up the paper into cardboard - very "professional" looking. Oh well. The essay was well-written . . .

anotherNJmom · 02-06-2008, 12:48 PM

Update info send via email and snail mail? Thanks for the info CD.

bethievt · 02-06-2008, 12:53 PM

Yes, it is just a small percentage who don't and I think it's mostly ones who don't send in the application forms, though one other reason I've heard is tanking on the SAT's. I, in fact am an example of a semi-finalist who never sent in the application because I was already in college, that college didn't give them, my Dad didn't work for anyone who did either and I didn't see the point.

As I recall, the essay my son wrote for NM was, with few changes, the one he used on his CA. I was grateful he was forced to write an essay so early in the process, because it would be so easy to procrastinate.

I was really happy when son's NM thing came in because a few of his colleges made a big point of caring about this. Hope you'll be celebrating soon, mammall.

CountingDown · 02-06-2008, 12:55 PM

mammall,
What I've read here on other threads is that kids who were not selected as finalists were notified in January. Couldn't hurt to check with the GC just to confirm she's on the list, since I've seen others post in the past couple of days that GCs have gotten lists of finalists.

I don't know if that NMF list is addressed to the principal or GC, though -- I've heard plenty of stories about those forms sitting on the P's desk for a while!

(NMSF forms sat on our principal's desk for at least two weeks last year.)

wjb · 02-06-2008, 12:56 PM

Our GC received snail mail notification about our school's Finalists on Monday.

CountingDown · 02-06-2008, 12:59 PM

Page 4 of the pdf has the dates --

http://www.nationalmerit.org/Merit_R&I_Leaflet.pdf

mammall · 02-06-2008, 03:34 PM

Our GC is out of town. Will be back tomorrow. No one has heard anything at her school and there were 12 NMSFs so I'm not going to start worrying. Of course, nothing is a given, and her application really did look kludgey.

rainmama · 02-06-2008, 06:02 PM

I think if you haven't heard a "no" yet you can be very confident, mammall.

My son brought home his finalist certificate from school today - yay! Thanks for the urging to send the info to colleges - even if it's pretty typical to advance, it does make sense that a school might count it as a relevant statistic. And of course, we're dialed in to the schools on his list who give NM awards, even if he's not ready to select the one school yet.

I've been reading the thread on demonstrated interest, and I guess we can use this letter about NM as an opportunity to "show the love". S is just not going to be visiting colleges again until he has some decisions back, and I can't think of any other ways to show interest.